The following continues the serialization of Chapter 6 from SIMPLE SOLUTIONS for Humanity.
PEARL AND I THEN FLEW TO CAIRO. This is where it gets bizarre. Getting a visa was trivial, but as in life itself, agonizing, if you don't know how to do it. First, you are not told that you needed one until you got there, and then, no one seemed to know how to get one. There were numerous lines for various things, and the one that gave the visa was the one that exchanged money, so we lucked out.
IF YOU PLAN ON GOING TO EGYPT, JOIN A PACKAGED TOUR. Don't just show up and expect to catch a taxi to your hotel. Well, this "government official" came up to us and said that she needed to escort us out of the airport. She even had a badge, and this was before you went through customs. It turns out this is a scam, and she diverted us to a tour desk, where we were badgered to sign up for inflated tours. We somehow were able to resist, and they gave up and charged us 50 Egyptian Pounds (3.5 pounds to the dollar) to take us to the Nile Hilton. We were kind of spooked, and did not then realize that they did us a favor, for if we caught a taxi off the street, who knows where we would be now, although I somewhere read that, because of the culture, Cairo is the safest Western metropolis. The air-conditioned van ride to the hotel was comfortable, the driver spoke English and he gave us a free tour of the city. Only in afterthought did I realize that the government passed us through this process because there were no other options for tours. If this is not making sense to you, read on.
I might interject that Egypt is #123 among the 182 countries in the United Nations Human Development Index. Norway is #1 and the USA #13.
The Nile Hilton is the worst Hilton I have ever experienced. Staff attitude was atrocious. The place was going to seed. We were given a room with an overpowering odor of tobacco, and was moved to one where the door safety latch was previously forced open, and just hung on one screw. There is no information guide in the room, and when I asked for a map at the Concierge Desk, was told to buy one at the book store. However, there was an internet café close by (hotels typically charge about 6 times more than these coffee shops), the Egyptian Museum was next door, and the Nile was across the street. Just walking around (outside) the hotel, though, is an adventure, as there are swarms of people just sitting on the curb or standing and doing nothing. Everything here ranges from brownish gray to grayish brown, even the Nile, and the entire city is like a ghetto for 20 million people.
That night, we decided to move. I had previously made a reservation at a Sheraton which was scheduled to open earlier this year. We somehow got their telephone number, and at 5AM called to see if they would honor something I had cancelled two months before. To my surprise, the person who answered said come on over, and even gave me a $95 rate, which compared well with the $165 Hilton room. We checked out the next morning and were asked by the uniformed person, who was picking us up. When we said that we needed to catch a taxi, he flinched, and showed body language like, you're kidding. He said he'd do what he could to arrange for a safe taxi. (By the way, you might recall that Bangkok had a serial taxi robber/murderer that lasted about a year. He mostly killed Europeans. It turns out he wasn’t Thai, but was an Egyptian.) He waved a couple of cabs on and selected one where they settled on a 25 pound rate to take us to the Sheraton Royal Garden, which was surprising in two respects. First we were changing hotels, and he was good humored about it, and second, no one knew where this hotel was located, as it had just opened.
We caught our last taxi in Cairo, I hope. The temperature here ranges from 95 to 100 degrees, and no taxi is air conditioned. The vehicles themselves are used car rejects from Yugoslavia, or something close.
In Athens, Istanbul and Cairo, for a ten day period, we never saw any blue sky or even a cloud, for air pollution obscured the sky. The airport and traffic in Cairo are reminiscent of Manila and Bangkok 15 years ago. If a road had three lanes, there were two more, if the road was wide enough. No one paid any attention to the lines, and not much to traffic lights. Our taxi was bumped and the driver just gave the offender an evil eye and moved on. The thought of us stopping in the middle of this traffic with our baggage would have been nightmarish. There were people on street corners selling one cigarette and individual bandages. Interesting that we saw a number of older adults with what looked like their head completely covered like a mummy. Well, the taxi found our hotel, a true miracle, because even the hotel staff said no one can find it.
The Sheraton Royal Gardens is an oasis. It has been operating since March, but portions are not yet completed. The staff is incredible, so much so that I began to worry...and still do. They call us up twice a day to ask if there is anything else they can do.
Let me share, though, some concerns: (You think this was bizarre? No, bizarre hasn't happened yet, it's coming next.)
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The Dow Jones Industrial Average sunk 144 to 10,271, while world markets were also down, especially Europe. Gold was up $4/toz to $1233 and crude oil slipped below $75/barrel.
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A small disturbance popped up in the East Pacific, but nothing to worry about at this time.
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